Fang's Blog: School's Out Forever
by yo-i'm-katie
Summary: Ever wanted to see inside Fang's head as the Flock go on their adventures? This is basically School's Out- Forever from Fang's point of view. I got most of the dialogue from the book, so sorry if its not that funny and original. Please R&R!
1. Chapter 1

**A/N : **

**Hey y'all**

**So I started writing this because I've always wanted to read the books from other flock members points of view, and I thought I'd start with Fang because he's my favourite character. Apologies if its absolute crap. It's my first fanfic. Ever. Like, today I had my first cheese and pickle sandwich. It was gross, but whatever.**

**None of the characters owned are mine, nor the storyline, James Patterson has that honour.**

**Here goes.**

**Chapter 1 – Say whaaaat?**

Okay. I've never done anything like this before, so I'm just gonna jump in and you gotta try and keep up. I know Max already wrote something like this, but her head gets boring at times, you know? This is what happened from _my _point of view.

So we were just cruising along, about 8.30 am, minding our own business. Like all normal bird kids do. Max was teaching the younger kids how to do dive-bombs – just tuck your wings in and go along for the ride. Me and Ig were just talking quietly, nothing in particular, though all of Ig's comments always referred to some sexual innuendo or other. That boy...man, I mean he's my brother and everything but jeez, that boy is dirty.

I caught Max's eye and grinned at her. I was the only one who really _got_ her love of flying. The younger kids just kinda took it for granted, but Max and I felt happiest cruising at 9000 feet in the air.

Max looked away as Gazzer said, "Oh my gosh! A UFO!" I sighed, that hadn't been funny the first time, let alone the last hundred. Nothing like an eight year old's sense of humour. Nudge pulled up to Max's right wing, and asked her how long it would take to get to DC. I silently calculated in my head – we had been flying for just over eighteen hours, leaving another hour, hour and a half to go, just as Max reached the same conclusion.

It's weird how she and me have the same thoughts most of the time. She's definitely my best friend in the group, but lately I've been seeing her kinda differently. She's hot, no doubt about it, but I've always just looked past it. Guess you have to if you live in the same house for 5 years. But still...

My thoughts were interrupted by the look on Max's face. She was carrying Total, our little black Scottie dog. Useless bloody thing – _why _did I let Angel bring him along? She was thinking about Ari again, I could tell because she's thought about almost nothing else for the last twenty-four hours. I flew up next to her, and murmured,

"You okay?"

"In what way?" she asked. "Can you be more specific?"

"Killing Ari." I said. May as well get it out.

She gave a sharp intake of breath, and I knew I'd got to her. I also knew that I was the only one who would go there. I needed to reassure her. I knew she'd done the right thing, even if she didn't.

"It was you or him. I'm glad you picked him." She exhaled, thinking it over. I knew that she knew about the whole Erasers-not-giving-a-crap-who-they-killed thing, but there was the added shock of it being Ari, the little guy who followed her around everywhere back at the School.

I surged away, leaving her to her thoughts. Nudge came over to me, and started jabbering about something to do with Washington. I zoned out after a while – not that I don't love the kid, but she needs to learn when to shut off the Nudge Channel.

I zoned back in when Max dumped a large black furry _lump _into my arms. She smiled brightly at me and bit her lip when Total licked my cheek to stop herself from laughing at my truly pissed off expression.

Total kept wriggling. "TOTAL!" I finally grunted. "STOP WRIGGLING!" Weirdly, after that he stopped, like he could understand me.

By dusk, we'd crossed over a large chunk of Pennsylvania, and the thin strip of ocean in below showed us to be in between New Jersey and Delaware. All this I knew from watching National Geographic in the E-shaped house in Colorado – to be honest, most of our knowledge came from there. "Look at this, kids, we're learning geography!" I shouted with mock excitement. Groans came from Iggy and the younger kids, and I caught Max's grin.

She did a 360, like she did every half an hour or so, and I heard her groan. "Fang, what's that? Behind, at three o'clock." I caught sight of a dark cloud heading towards us, made up of...what? Birds? Planes? Flying monkeys from _The Wizard Of Oz_?

"Too fast for a storm cloud. Too small, too..quiet for choppers. Not birds – too lumpy." I looked over at her. "I give up. What is it?"

"Trouble," she said grimly. She shouted over to the others. Gazzy suggested they were flying monkeys as well, which is just copying...I thought Angel was the mind reader. Whatever.

A look of comprehension came over Max. "No," she muttered. "_Flying Erasers_."

_Crap._

That's just...gross. Half-human, half-lupine and now half-avian? That's just _wrong_. "Erasers, version 6.5," I muttered.

"Split up!" Max ordered. "Nudge! Gazzy! Nine o'clock! Angel! Up top! Move it! Iggy and Fang, flank me from below! Fang, ditch the dog!"

"Nooo, Fang!" Angel screamed. I couldn't do it, so I stuffed the stupid animal into my pack. It was dark now, no moon, no city lights to illuminate, but we could still see the new wings, clumpy and heavy.

Max went on the offensive, and I backed her up. We knew each other's fighting styles so well now that it came naturally. I kicked out, and felt ribs break, then I clapped my hands over a pair of wolfy ears. I rolled and Max took my place, giving a sidekick to the mouth to the next Eraser and dislocating his arms.

She paused, I assumed listening to her Voice. I lashed out at any Eraser coming near her, breaking one's hip bone with a powerful roundhouse kick and dislocating another's shoulder with an armlock. Both dropped like stones. Max flew off to help Nudge and then Iggy, and I saw Angel order an Eraser to fall, using her scary mind powers. I grinned inwardly and shook my head, what would she grow up into?

An Eraser flew straight up to me, and I punched him straight in the face. "You...are...a...fridge...with...wings," I grunted in between punches. "We're...freaking...ballet...dancers." I dunno where the poetry came from, it just kinda flowed. I should be a poet. Maybe Head Poet. Poet of the Year.

Suddenly I felt a searing pain in my side. I looked down in surprise, just as Max yelled "FANG!" Ari's face – ARI? WHAT? – sneered up at me as he wheeled around and flew backwards, his lumpy wings flapping frantically.

Then the pain hit me. A searing, burning, throbbing pain all along my left side. I made sure not to let it show on my face, regardless of the fact that it had taken over my whole body. As Ari turned to face us, the six of us slowly grouped together, none seriously injured. I'm sure mine wasn't that bad.

It was just him against us. He seemed to realise this, because he looked around and fell back, closer to his squad of human-avian-lupine spazzes. He snarled "We'll be back!" and spun round, flying off clumsily. I couldn't help it; I had to say something sarcastic, regardless of the sensitive subject, regardless of the pain in my side.

"Boy, you can't just kill people like you used to."

**A/N: please review! First story and all that?**


	2. Chapter 2

**God, so sorry I haven't uploaded for a while guys. I've been so weighed down with exams and stuff, but I'm on half term no so I'm gonna try and finish this story this week and then upload it say twice a week? May not always stick to this pattern though, cos of school shit. **

**I had the weirdest week, with the whole Queen's Jubilee thing, have they celebrated that in America? Drop me a review telling me, I really want to know! Happy reading x**

* * *

**Chapter 2 – The Hospital.**

We stayed in place for a couple of minutes; just in case another attack came, beating our wings rhythmically and in synchronisation. We looked badass, I can tell you. My arm was pressed against my side. It really hurt, a lot more than it did a minute ago. I couldn't look properly at it until we landed, but I didn't want to give Max the satisfaction of wanting to land first. It's an old competitive thing we got going on, okay?

I noticed her watching me concernedly. "I'm fine," I almost snapped. A lie. I wasn't feeling good at all. As she told the others to report, I tried to compose myself. It couldn't be that bad, I mean nothing serious has happened to me before. I dislocated Max's arm once, when we were sparring, but then Jeb had just popped it back into place. That lying bastard. I told myself that if she could get over it easily, I could too.

We got into formation – Max at the head of the triangle, with Ange and Gazzy flanking her and then Nudge, me and Iggy at the back. I couldn't concentrate on anything. My heart beat was slowing slightly, instead of fast smooth blip-blip-blips they were erratic bleeps. My wings weren't stroking as they should – more kind of off-balance and ragged. My lips were pressed together with the effort of not shouting out.

I realised I was slipping behind. Max did too, and she turned and flew next to me, the rest of the flock about thirty feet in front.

"What's going on?" she said in that no-nonsense tone she used with me when she wanted something done but she knew that I'd desperately be wanting to say no. Like the laundry. Or the washing up. SCREW IT MAX I HATE DIRTY WATER. YOU HAPPY?

"Nothing," I said, and I could tell she knew I was lying through my teeth.

"Fang –" she began, then at the same time we noticed the blood pouring through my jacket and down my arm. "Your arm!"

"'S not my arm," I mumbled. God, it really hurt now. The pain flooded through my body, it was all I could focus on. I tried to picture Max in my mind, willed myself not to fall unconscious, but my eyes fluttered closed and I felt myself falling...falling...falling...

I was dreaming. Drifting through a misty world. Where the hell was I? It was sort of grey...with ghostly trees and smoky grey grass. No features or anything to focus upon. Suddenly I heard laughter in the distance. I followed it, but couldn't see anyone. It sounded like Max's laugh, the most beautiful sound in the world for me. Woah – where had that come from? I DO NOT think that way about my best friend.

The dream shifted. Max. Max was there. She was wearing a white dress coming to rest just above her knees, showing off her slim legs. Her brown hair was hanging loose about her shoulders, the blond sun-highlights showing up more prominently in the greenish light coming through the treetops. Her deep brown eyes were sparkling, and she was laughing at me in the way only she can.

She was so beautiful.

My dream-self walked towards her, my hands outstretched to hers. A noise whispered through my consciousness, a murmur of many voices, and I found myself swimming towards a brightly lit area, up...up...up...

I awoke lying on a hospital gurney.

My first thought was sheer damn panic. WHAT THE HELL AM I DOING HERE WHY AM I STRAPPED TO A HOSPITAL GURNEY WHY DOES IT SMELL OF BLOOD AND WHY DO I HAVE A DAMN TUBE STICKING DOWN MY THROAT? I thrashed my arms for a second before a man in green scrubs ran over and held them down.

"Calm down," he said soothingly. "You're safe now. The bear can't get you, you're safe." Bear? Last I remembered was Ari slicing through my...ohhh. Max would have made up a cover story. Rabid bear? Sounds legit.

I was wheeled into a white hospital room, trying not to panic too much. The doctors weren't wearing white coats, which was a good sign, but where were Max and Iggy and the Flock? Were they okay? What was happening? Why was I here? I tried to talk, to ask where my Flock were, but all I felt was the jab of a needle and slipping down into unconsciousness for the second time that day.

The next time I came round, the rest of the flock had joined me. Max was sitting next to me, the rest of them grouped around my bed. "Hey," Max said, sounding relieved. "How's it going?"

"Not too bad." I mumbled. "Just got a massive cut that I'm bleeding to death out of. How're things with you?"

"Just great." Iggy grinned. "We're gonna camp out in here tonight so I think we'll just go get our stuff."

A few minutes later, I was wishing I could go back to sleep. The kids were fighting again, and I had a massivo headachio that just wasn't leaving.

"The girls can have the bed," I heard Gazzy say. "Iggy and I can sleep on the floor."

"Excuse me, sexist piglet?" Max said, ever the feminist. "How about the two smallest people share the bed 'cause they'll _fit_. That would be you and Angel."

Gazzy harrumphed, and Nudge said, "Yeah. Like, I'm too much of a cream puff to sleep on the floor?"

Max walked over to where I was lying, clearly bored of the child-mutant conversation. "Of course, the prince gets his own bed all to himself," she mocked.

"That's right," I murmured. "The prince has a gaping side-wound."

"Well, they sewed you up," she replied. "You're pretty gape free at this point."

"When do I get out of here?" I asked. The hospital smells were making me crawl the walls.

"They say a week."

"So, like, tomorrow?" What with our badass healing powers and regenerative skills.

"That's what I'm thinking," she replied, smiling with relief at the thought of getting out of the hospital. We both hated it, Iggy too, after the eleven years of being stuck inside the School being used as _experiments_.

The kids weren't quite as scared and nervy as us, but then even Nudge had only had eight years of torture rather than eleven.

I heard Iggy yell at me from the other side of my room. "So, Fnick, can I change the channel? There's a game on." _Fnick?_ What exactly was that about? I glanced at Max, a question in my eyes, but she just giggled and looked away.

"Make yourself at home, _Figgy._" May as well just go with it.

I was exhausted. Almost dying really takes it out of you. I was one of the last to go to sleep, and before I crashed I heard Max go round the room, checking everyone was okay. That's my best friend, ever the mother hen. When she got to me, I pretended to be asleep, and I heard her sigh and sniff, almost like she was about to cry.


	3. Chapter 3

**Here's another one. Hope you enjoy it and all that. Oh, by the way, I just wanted to dedicate at least _one_ chapter to Phoenix Fanatic, because frankly _Diary of a Lovesick Mutant _is _the_ best fanfic I have ever read. If you haven't read it already, go check it out! Happy reading x**

**Chapter 3 – Anne Walker**

I looked up at the middle-aged doctor standing over my bed. Max was next to me, and for that I was thankful. I needed a familiar presence because of the hellish feeling the hospital brought on.

"I don't understand it," the guy said, utterly confused. He was staring at my side as if it he could see it knitting together as he watched. The wound had practically gone, only a few pink scars were left.

"Guess I'm good to go," I said, trying to sit up, but it still hurt a lot. It wasn't the same ripping, burning pain as it was yesterday, but an aching, spiking pain that wasn't as bad.

A woman that I didn't recognise came up to the side of the bed. I glanced at Max and she mouthed _Anne Walker_. Oh, so _this_ was the woman she'd told me about this morning, when that cute, red-haired nurse came in to take my temperature at six. (I smiled at her. Don't tell anyone, it'll ruin the whole emo image thing I got going on – only smiling when I have to, or at Max.) The woman who wanted us to go to her house to live for a while, God knows why.

"Wait!" she said, gesturing at me. "You're nowhere near ready to move or leave. Please, Nick, just lie still and rest." _Excuse me? _ Who was she to tell me what I can and can't do? We've not listened to adults for practically our whole lives, let alone ones we don't know. So I just looked at her. Stared at her. She was _not _going to tell us what to do.

"Nick, now you're feeling a bit better, maybe you can convince your brothers and sisters to leave with me," Anne continued. I internally rolled my eyes, like the Flock would listen to me anyway. "I've offered for all of you to come stay at my house, to rest and regroup." She smiled slightly. "Max refused to leave without you. But I'm sure you can see that it's pointless for them to stay here and be uncomfortable. And you'd be joining us in a week or so."

I just looked at her, waiting for her to ask me how I felt about it all. I knew what I'd reply anyway, I didn't want to leave the Flock and they sure as heck didn't want to leave me, I knew that already.

Here it came. "So, how do you feel about it, Nick?"

I glanced at Max, and one side of her mouth drooped in mock sadness. I laughed internally.

"Whatever Max says, she's the leader," I replied calmly. I felt her smile beside me, I knew she loved hearing that sentence.

"I can't leave Nick," she said, trying to sound regretful and succeeding, only I could hear the undercurrent of laughter.

Anne dismissed the doctor, who sounded pissed to be sent away in his own hospital. "We heal really quickly," Max said to Anne. I was only have listening, I was suddenly really darn hungry.

"What do I have to do to get some food in this joint?" I grumbled.

"You still have an IV, the doctors don't want you to eat solid..." Anne's voice faded as I glared at her. When Fang wants food, he _gets_ food.

"We saved a tray for you," Max grinned. Ah, bless. She knew me so well.

The smell of the food brought back memories of the School food, even though this stuff was much nicer and practically luxurious compared to the "nutritional paste" we had been given there.

"I need to get out of here," I said, chewing the hamburger Nudge had saved for me. "The hospital smells alone are making me crawl the walls." And they were. It was horrible. Max looked at me sympathetically, and I grimaced at her. She understood me, and I was thankful for the almost-telepathy between us.

"I think F-Nick is ready to come with us," she told Anne.

Anne agreed, surprising us. I thought there would be more arguing than that. Interesting.

Max called the rest of the Flock into my room. "I don't know what's coming guys, but keep your eyes open and your heads up." She looked at me. "You sure you can move?"

I shrugged. Of course I could, but I was still in a quite a lot of pain. I pushed away my food tray. "Sure," I said as I lay down and shut my eyes.

"After all, Fnick is superman," Ig said. I grinned, and Max said, "Shut up, Jeff." But I knew she was smiling. We all were.

I was wheeled in a wheelchair down to the car park, where Anne's massive Suburban was parked. Anne reclined the back seat in the middle for me, with Max on one side and Angel on the other. My side stung as we got into the car, but once I was lying down it was okay. We started off as soon as we could, with Total on Max's lap.

There was quiet chat in the car, but I stayed quiet, focusing on not exclaiming in pain every time we went over a bump. I noticed Max looking at me in concern, _again_, but I didn't say anything, and just lay as if I was asleep.

I felt Max get jittery next to me. Her skin felt sweaty and her heartbeat was erratic. I sat up painfully and looked at her, shocked, but obviously not showing it. Her face was taut and I touched her hand, she glanced at me but then looked away.

Total stepped off of her lap and onto mine, then onto Angel's. I lay down, but after I touched her shoulder and stroked her hair. In a _brotherly_ way, obviously.

As we drove through Virginia, what struck me was the almost picturesque houses, trees and fields. They were _too _perfect. I heard Nudge chattering away to Anne, about _Gone With The Wind_ and maple trees, but I zoned her out again. Don't get me wrong, I love her, I've always had a soft spot for Nudgie, but her chatting is so different from my preferable silence that I had enough sometimes.

We drove up to a pair of wrought iron gates, and through them with Anne having clicked a gadget on her dashboard. As they closed behind us, the hairs on the back of my neck stood up, and all my sense went on alert, as I knew Max's were. The drive was made out of crushed shells, and colourful trees arced overheard. As we drove up to the house, my eyes took in the hydrangea bushes, the orchard, the wide hills, the river rocks at the bottom of the house. The house was picture-perfect, stereotypical Virginian American.

"The air smells different here," said Nudge as we got out of the car, max supporting me. I hated looking so weak but it was necessary, my side was still hurting. "It smells great."

Anne opened the front door, with us all just standing there open mouthed. We had never seen such beauty in one place before, and we were stunned. "Well, don't just stand there, come see your rooms," she laughed. I decided that I was warming to her, very slightly, indeed the kids had already run inside at Max's nod.

"What does it look like?" Iggy murmured to me. I looked at my brother, and yet again felt the pang of pity I felt whenever I realised he couldn't see what we could.

"It looks like paradise, Jeff."


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: Hey, here's another. Not really sure if anyone's reading this, but MEGA thanks to AwesomeCoolPerson for reviewing, really made my day 3 and thanks for saying that bit was funny, I'm quite funny in real life but my true funnyness does not come out in my writing :')**

**Happy Reading x**

**Chapter 4 – The House**

The first thing I did when I went inside the house? Showered. I hadn't showered in three weeks, and being a teenage boy I was frankly in desperate need of one. The scalding water burned my side wound, but made me feel so much better, inside and out. It was like it was washing away the stench of the hospital, so like that of the School.

Then I dressed , in my Dirty Projectors T-shirt and black - obviously – jeans. I decided to look round, correctly guessing that Max would be too busy looking after the flock and making sure they were cleaned up.

On the ground floor of the, well, _mansion_, there was a large modern kitchen, with a wall separating it from the dining room. There was a big wooden table with eight chairs surrounding it at the other end of the kitchen – very spacious and open-plan. There were large French doors leading out from this space – useful for an escape, I noticed.

Interestingly, the upstairs was bigger than the downstairs. There were seven bedrooms – one for Anne, one for each of us. Coincidence? My guard was now up again, I had never trusted a grown-up before, except Jeb, who had turned out to be a coward and a liar anyway, and I wasn't about to start now.

There were _five_ bathrooms. _Five_. In one house. _Five bathrooms_. This place just seemed too good to be true.

I went to Max's room, where she was towel drying her hair. "Yo, Max."

"What's up, Fang?" she smiled at me. I could tell she was in a good mood, probably due to the shower she'd just had.

"Just had a look around. Some okay escape routes, upstairs bigger than downstairs, and the fridge is massive," I said, in my usual, succinct way. I don't see the point in using more words than usual, so I don't.

"Thanks Fang, what would I do without you," she grinned.

"Well you definitely wouldn't survive very long," I told my best friend. She rolled her eyes.

"Get out, Fang, I'm in a towel." Oops.

About half an hour later, I heard Gazzy go ask Max if we could go flying. Me and Ig were playing an intense game of table tennis, and I certainly wasn't going to quit first. We were drawing at two games all, and, because this is bird-kid table tennis, the loser of each game had to fly around the house three times in penalty.

It hurt, especially with my side, but whatever. It was great.

Max leant out of 'her' bedroom window, and shouted down to us in the backyard. "Yo, guys! We're going flying; get your butts up and away now!"

Iggy looked at me. "Do you think she remembers that we're the same age as her?"

I chuckled. "Dude, its Max. Of course she does, she just doesn't care."

We flew around outside for a few hours. There was a massive red outbuilding that I could hear held animals, most prominent of which were horses.

"What is that, like, a plane hangar?" Nudge said, staring at the building. I certainly could have been, what with the size of it.

"It's a barn," I said. I could see Max keeping an eye on me, which kind of irritated me. She's my best friend, not my freaking mother, and she knew I hated to look weak.

We landed inside the entrance of the barn, after Angel had realised it may be a barn with animals. How exciting. Though I guess it would be to a six year old who had never seen a real farm animal before in her life.

The first animal we came to was a large gray horse, who was surveying us calmly. Gazzy was staring at it, like he was having a conversation with it, and he was intently looking at its huge rump – as if amazed that any animal could have so much farting potential.

Anne came up behind us, making the others jump. I heard her, so did Iggy, we have the best senses out of the Flock, even better than Max's. Except Iggy's sight, of course, since...y'know...he's blind.

Anne started giving Nudge advice on how to feed 'Sugar', and Nudgie was gazing at the horse enraptured. She was terrified of feeding it, even though this was a girl that could knock out two fully grown men at once. I glanced at Max, she was smiling softly at the happiness of her Flock.

I wondered about Anne. Here she was, after only just having met us, but already looking after us as if we were her own. There had to be some ulterior motive, it couldn't be that she was just being nice to us for the sake of it. Grown-ups were not nice; I'd learnt that from experience.

"You guys have another half an hour," said grown-up called suddenly. "Dinner's at six."

See? She was just _too_ good to be true.

A few minutes later, we went out to Anne's pond in her backyard. It was huge but quite shallow, meaning it was still warm enough to swim in, even in early October. Especially for four bird-kids who had never been to a pool in their lives.

The whole place was kind of creepily idyllic. Having never seen such a perfect place before, and having been raised to be sceptical, critical and sarcastic (not intentionally, I might add), Max and I were very much on our guard.

We walked past the pond, and further out towards the rolling, beautiful hills in the background. See what I mean? I'm _Fang_. I'm _manly_. I do not use such words as _beautiful_ and _rolling_, especially not twice in one day. It was too kind of picturesque.

There were yet more animals out here. "Anne is quite the animal lover." I remarked, falling into step besides Max. "Horses, sheep, goats. Chickens. Pigs."

"Yeah," she replied. "I wonder who's for dinner?" I grinned one of my rare grins at her, and saw her face go red. She strode past me, and up towards the Gasman and Iggy. _What was that about? _

Girls.

**A/N: written to Summer Of '69 by Bryan Adams. What a legendary song. Anyone got any good rock songs? Review and tell me! x**


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: Hey again! I'm trying to make every chapter over 1k words, because I hate it when the little side bar on my phone that I read my fics on is too long, it's so irritating. This is quite a long chapter for me, I'm very proud. Anyway, onwards with the show my chums! (for any of you who watch Miranda)**

**Happy reading x**

**Chapter 5 – Co-ordinates**

"Okay, let's see what we have here," Max murmured as she spread out the notes we had liberated from the Institute in New York on her bed. The six of us were in her room, poring over the notes, trying to find something useful, but it was all just numerical code.

"How about we each take two pages and comb through them," Max suggested. "Figure out what we can. See if anything about the numbers looks familiar or has a pattern."

"Sounds like a plan," Iggy replied, "Except for me."

Bless him. "I'll read you out some numbers," I told him, punching him lightly on the shoulder. He grinned and nodded in thanks.

I started to read out the numbers to Iggy, softly so the rest of them wouldn't be disturbed. He was deep in concentration, and this was good because he was our best code breaker.

For the next two hours we concentrated, trying every basic code breaking technique that we knew. We had learned most of them from Jeb, who wanted to give us survival skills, and then Max and I had taught Nudge, Gazzy and Angel later on. We got nowhere. Iggy was on the verge of giving up, but I forced him to keep going, for some reason I desperately wanted to figure this out.

It was like there was something holding me back from the answer, like I knew what it was but I wouldn't be able to realise it. I was thankful when Max broke in with "This is impossible. This is probably a computerised code, if it is we'll never break it."

I sighed, at least _I_ knew there was an answer, I just had to figure it out.

"But isn't everything some kind of test?" Gazzy said tiredly. "Didn't Jeb tell you that everything was a test, back at the School, when we were rescuing Angel?" It was almost ten, and I knew what was going through Max's head. The kids needed to go to bed. We didn't know how long we'd be staying here and so needed to catch up on as much sleep as we could. "So that would mean we're supposed to break it somehow."

"I've thought of that," Max replied. "That's what's so irritating. I've tried everything that would occur to me, so I guess I've flunked this test."

A tap on the door made us jump. After years of being just by ourselves in a house, we'd almost forgotten that Anne was here.

"Hey guys," she smiled. _Guys? _We were not her _guys_. I still didn't trust her. "Sleepy yet? Krystal? Want to get ready for bed?"

"Yep," Nudge replied. "I'm beat." I knew she was saying that to get out of code-breaking.

Gazzy agreed, saying that they were just about to crash anyway.

"Good," Anne said easily. "Anyone need anything? Before you crash?"

"No, we're fine," said Angel, following her out of the room. As they walked down the hall, I looked over at Max. Her face was a little flushed, not in the sweaty, jittery way but in a sad, almost feeling sorry for herself way. I realised it was because she was the one who should have been making them go to bed and looking after them – Anne was looking after her Flock.

Welcome to another day at Camp Agent! Iggy and Max (I know, don't say anything) made breakfast, massivo quantities of bacon, toast and eggs for everyone. I love bacon. It's like, the food of the gods.

Then Anne told us to keep our rooms tidy. In case you didn't catch that, here it is again. _Anne told us to keep our rooms tidy_. She _told_ us. In case you don't remember, I have some sort of complex that prevents me from taking orders from adults. It's perfectly normal. But the kids were all over that command, they actually did it.

After that, each day was practically the same:

Breakfast – huuuge infusions of toast, eggs and Bacon.

Tidying our rooms

Rousing exercise – either flying, or swimming in the pond out back. Nudge and Angel loved to go horseback riding or play with the other animals.

Lunch - sandwiches.

Flying – Anne loved to watch us fly, thousands of feet in the air. I practised the hawk techniques; I was really to getting good at those. In this time, I taught Max and Iggy how to fly like them too, and they also started to get it. What was weird was that Anne never tired of watching us fly; she'd stand out there for hours, like she was studying us or something.

Dinner – Anne tried. Iggy helped. The food was hot and good. Enough for me.

One night after we'd been there almost two weeks, I was poring over that code again in my room. I was so nearly there, I could feel it. I was about to crack it.

I looked around my room for inspiration. Okay, not for inspiration, I was just incredibly bored. My eyes rested on the large map of the world in the corner – don't ask me why I have that. I'm a bit of a geek at heart.

Suddenly, something clicked. You know like in cartoons, when the light bulb appears over the protagonist's head when they figure something out? It was almost exactly like that. A Eureka moment. That was a good programme.

ANYWAY, I looked down at the numbers again, and all of sudden they looked like map co-ordinates. OF COURSE! Why could I not think of this before? I ran downstairs, where I knew Anne kept a map of Washington DC in the first drawer down on the left side of the hall dresser. So I _may_ have snooped through all of Anne's stuff when she was at the grocer's. Sue me.

The first co-ordinate I looked up was 27 8G9. I held my breath with excitement as the exact clump of streets came into focus. I tried it again with the numbers next to Nudge's name, Monique. Again, I came up with something. _Max_. I had to tell her right away.

I ran up to her room. Liam Rooney was blasting out of her little speakers, and I heard Max singing along to it loudly. Some sort of emotion swelled inside of me, I had no idea what, but suddenly I just wanted to hug her, glad that she was so happy.

I tapped on her door. "Yeah?" I heard her say. I went in. "What's up?"

"Look," I said, dumping the map and the sheets onto her lap. "I was looking at this stuff, going nuts you know? And suddenly it looked like map co-ordinates."

She gasped quietly, her brow furrowing in realisation.

"This is a book of detailed street maps of Washington DC," I continued. "I got it out of Anne's car. Look – each page is numbered, each grid of each map is numbered. And look at this clump of stuff here, by Gazzy's name." The stuff I had looked up a minute ago. "Twenty seven, eight, G nine.

"So I go to page twenty seven, and it's a section of town, see?"

"Yeah," she breathed.

I took this as my cue to carry on. "This section has twelve smaller maps. I go to map eight," here I flipped over a couple pages, "Which is a blow-up of one section. Then I go to column G and trace it down to row nine." I slowly moved my finger down the map. "And it's a pretty specific little chunk of streets."

"Oh, my God," Max whispered. "Did you try any others?"

"This one by Nudge's name. Same thing – I actually ended up with a real place," I nodded.

"You are so brilliant," she said. For some reason, this compliment made my heart beat faster and I almost blushed, except I never blush. I am a _man_. "But I though Nudge was pretty sure she'd found her parents in Arizona," she continued.

I shrugged, I wasn't convinced. "I don't know. The woman we saw was black but it wasn't like Nudge was a photocopy of her. You think it's worth checking this out?"

"Absolutely," she grinned, getting off of her bed. "Everyone else asleep?"

"Yeah. Including the Annemeister." _Awesome._ She now has a nickname.

"Okay. Gimme a minute to get some jeans on."

"Hmm," Max muttered as I propped the map up against a fire hydrant with one knee. We'd flown over to D.C. about an hour ago, and we were now looking for the first co-ordinates, the ones by Gazzy's name. We hadn't managed to find any proper houses at the co-ordinates, so I was double-checking them to make sure. I couldn't let this one be a waste of time. I had felt so _sure_.

"No, you're right. This is it," she said. "If those are map co-ordinates, then this is where we should be." I hoped. What if I'd been totally wrong? How stupid would I look in front of her if this was not right?

We looked at the building across from us. Not a house, not even a flat, but a _pizza parlour_. There in fact no houses on the whole block, only a car wash, bank, dry cleaner, and the pizza place. Nowhere where Gazzy could have been taken from or born.

"Well, crap," I said, trying to hide my feelings of utter disappointment behind a sarcastic remark.

"I concur with that assessment," Max agreed, crossing the street. "Maybe there was an apartment building here and it got torn down?"

I gestured at a photo I had seen earlier inside the pizza joint, of a load of people standing in front of a black and white storefront with the caption, "Here since 1954." Unless Gaz was secretly over sixty years old, I doubted this was the place he was born.

"So much for that theory," I muttered. I was seriously annoyed with myself. How could _I_ have thought I could crack what Max couldn't? _You are nothing compared to her_, a small voice said in the back of my head. Not a Voice voice, just a little voice of contempt. Everyone has one.

"Do you want to swear this time do you want me to?" she asked.

"You can," I sighed, stowing away the map and code sheet into my jacket.

"Well, _crap_," she said. "Okay. Let's try the next one. Maybe we'll get lucky."

And we did. At the next address there was abandoned apartment building. It was among a hellish block, with about five guys all at different stages of drunkenness and handing over drugs, even at two in the morning.

"Let's check it out anyway," Max whispered, drawing back further into the shadows.

We landed on the roof of the building of our co-ordinates, and waited for half an hour. This showed us that two losers were squatting in this decrepit rat-hole, maybe more. Twenty minutes after the second crackhead left and didn't come back, probably going off to get more drinks or worse, Max stood up. "Ready?"

"Ready," I said quietly.

As we crept into the building, We were immediately hit by the stench of the scumbags, and Max recoiled in horror. Even _we_ never smelled that bad, and we usually only had access to washing water if we came to a freaking _lake_.

"Least favourite place?" Max said quietly. "Sewer tunnels of New York? Or abandoned home of squatting crackheads?"

I considered. Pros of crackheads' home: reasonably warm, not too bad structure. Cons: stink, bad decorations, _crackheads_. Pros of sewer tunnels: umm, none.

"I'd have to go with sewer tunnels of New York," I whispered back.

Two hours later, after tapping on floors and fireplaces and generally doing all we could remember from James Bond and Scooby-Doo , we had got nowhere. Again, the feeling of disappointment washed over me.

"Yeah." I muttered. "Well, get this last closet and we'll split." As Max walked over and rooted through the closet, I ran my fingers through my dark hair. The feeling of letting her down again stirred inside me. I felt so guilty, I had got both our hopes up only to have them dash-

Max gasped.

"What?" I whispered urgently.

"Nothing, I'm sure," she replied quietly. "But I'll just get it..."

Her fingers scraped along the wood and she pulled the white piece of paper out of the back of the closet. Her breath caught, and I darted over to look over her shoulder.

It was a _photograph_ – the spitting image of the baby Gasman.


End file.
